Sam Adams Pulls Sponsorship Of Boston St. Patrick's Day Parade Over Ban On Gays

After a handful of local restaurants and bars in the Boston area started dumping Sam Adams, folks behind the iconic American beer brand owned by billionaire James Koch (pictured) have announced that the company will no longer support the city's anti-gay St. Patrick's Day Parade.

[Parade] Organizers reportedly objected to MassEquality’s request that its members be allowed to carry banners displaying their sexual orientation. They also noted the group in question, LGBT Veterans for Equality, was not a recognized veterans’ organization. Boston Mayor Martin Walsh and U.S. congressman Stephen Lynch intervened, but a resolution was not reached.

“We were hopeful that both sides of this issue would be able to come to an agreement that would allow everyone, regardless of orientation, to participate in the parade. But given the current status of the negotiations, we realize this may not be possible,” Boston Beer Co. said in astatement its spokesperson referred inquiries to. “We share these sentiments with Mayor Walsh, Congressman Lynch and others and therefore we will not participate in this year’s parade.”

Boston's St. Patrick's Day Parade takes place on Sunday and is expected to draw more than a million spectators.

If I am going to a parade that celebrates Irish heritage, I want to see things in the parade that actually have to do with Irish heritage. I don't care what ANY of them do in the privacy of their own lives. Let me repeat myself. It is a parade about Irish heritage.

I've always found it strange that people have fled Ireland, which has, by most historic accounts I've read, been an absolute nightmare of a place, for hundreds of years.

A fertile country where they couldn't even grow enough food to feed the locals, a people who were basically Nazi's during the war, with a history of bombings and terrorism that are immortalized in film upon film about how horrible it is to be Irish.

Yet, with all this "heritage", people love banging drums and going green - people who's ancestors left generations ago, people who aren't Irish.

This is a well worded statement. It is obvious they had PR people working overtime, because earlier this week when a Boston bar stopped serving Sam Adams beer, Boston Beer claimed they support all kinds of groups and had no intention of pulling sponsorship of the St. Patrick's Day Parade, at least in Boston.

I'm glad the LGBT community has political and financial clout, but do we honestly think that the politicians who won't march and the companies that won't sponsor the St. Patrick's Day Parade really care about the issues involved or do they want our votes and dollars? Also, as someone who marched in the parade as a kid in a marching band more than 30 years ago, unless it has changed it's really not worth the trip. I know, I'm cynical, and maybe I need to lighten up and have a beer, but support means s a great deal, pandering gets tiring, and to me Boston Beer is pandering.